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Climate change is predicted to increase the frequency of extreme weather events, increasing the vulnerability of smallholder farmers dependent on rain-fed agriculture. We evaluate the extent to which farmers in Malawi suffer crop production losses due to extreme weather, and whether sustainable land management (SLM) practices help shield crop production losses from extreme events. We use a three period panel dataset where widespread floods and droughts occurred in separate periods, offering a unique opportunity to evaluate impacts using data collected immediately following these events. Results show that crop production outcomes were severely hit by both floods and droughts, with average losses ranging between 32–48 per cent. Legume intercropping provided protection against both floods and droughts, while green belts provided protection against floods. However, we find limited evidence that SLM adoption decisions are driven by exposure to weather shocks; rather, farmers with more productive assets are more likely to adopt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our study provides a nationally representative analysis of the gender gap in agricultural productivity in Malawi. We decompose the gap, for the first time, at the mean and selected points of the agricultural productivity distribution into (i) a portion driven by gender differences in levels of observable attributes, and (ii) a portion driven by gender differences in returns to the same set of observables. We find that while female-managed plots are, on average, 25% less productive, 82% of this mean differential is explained by differences in observables, mainly due to high-value crop cultivation and household adult male labor inputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Across the developing world, public goods exert significant impacts on the local rural economy in general and agricultural productivity and welfare outcomes in particular. Economic and social-cultural heterogeneity have, however, long been documented as detrimental to collective capacity to provide public goods. In particular, women are often underrepresented in local leadership and decision-making processes, as are young adults and minority ethnic groups. While democratic principles dictate that broad civic engagement by women and other groups could improve the efficiency and effectiveness of local governance and increase public goods provision, the empirical evidence on these hypotheses is scant. This article develops a theoretical model highlighting the complexity of constructing a 'fair' schedule of individual contributions, given heterogeneity in costs and benefits that accrue to people depending, for instance, on their gender, age, ethnicity, and education. The model demonstrates that representative leadership and broad participation in community organizations can mitigate the negative impacts of heterogeneity on collective capacity to provide public goods. Nationally representative household survey data from Malawi, combined with geospatial and administrative information, are used to test this hypothesis and to estimate the relationship between collective capacity for public good provision and community median estimates of maize yields and household consumption expenditures per capita. The analysis shows that similarities between the leadership and the general population in terms of gender and age, and active participation by women and young adult in community groups, alleviate the negative effects of heterogeneity and increase collective capacity, which in turn improves agriculture productivity and welfare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides recommendations on how large-scale household surveys should be conducted to generate the data needed to train models for satellite-based crop type mapping in smallholder farming systems. The analysis focuses on maize cultivation in Malawi and Ethiopia, and leverages rich, georeferenced plot-level data from national household surveys that were conducted in 2018–20 and integrated with Sentinel-2 satellite imagery and complementary geospatial data. To identify the approach to survey data collection that yields optimal data for training remote sensing models, 26,250 in silico experiments are simulated within a machine learning framework. The best model is then applied to map seasonal maize cultivation from 2016 to 2019 at 10-m resolution in both countries. The analysis reveals that smallholder plots with maize cultivation can be identified with up to 75% accuracy. Collecting full plot boundaries or complete plot corner points provides the best quality of information for model training. Classification performance peaks with slightly less than 60% of the training data. Seemingly little erosion in accuracy under less preferable approaches to georeferencing plots results in the total area under maize cultivation being overestimated by 0.16–0.47 million hectares (8–24%) in Malawi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Accurate individual-level data on asset ownership is important to understand men's and women's economic opportunities. • We compare two concurrent national surveys in Malawi that differed in how they collected data on asset ownership and rights. • Interviewing one knowledgeable household member versus all adult household members yielded key gender differences. • Interviewing one knowledgeable household member led to higher rates of men's exclusive reported and economic land ownership. • Interviewing one knowledgeable household member led to lower rates of women's joint reported and economic ownership of land. Monitoring international goals on land ownership and rights relies fundamentally on the quality of underlying data, which, in the context of surveys, are directly impacted by how respondents are selected. This study leverages two national surveys in Malawi that asked households about household members' ownership and rights of agricultural land, but which differed in their approach to respondent selection. Compared with the international best practice of privately interviewing adults about their personal asset ownership and rights, the analysis reveals that the business-as-usual approach of interviewing only a most knowledgeable household member on adult members' ownership and rights of agricultural land leads to (i) a higher share of men claiming exclusive reported and economic ownership, and (ii) a lower share of women claiming joint reported and economic ownership. Using private interviews of spouses' ownership and rights over the same set of parcels, the analysis also shows that when conflicting claims emerge, proxies for greater household status for women are positively associated with scenarios where women attribute at least some land ownership to themselves. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The impact of individuals' tenure security under customary regimes is investigated. • The analysis uses a unique survey experiment in Malawi. • Having land rights of bequest and sale increases investment and cash crop adoption. • Women's land rights joint with local institutional arrangements can amplify the effects. • The effects can be obscured by measurement error associated with traditional data collection. Although most of the world's agricultural land is cultivated under customary tenure regimes that tend to change over time in response to exogenous factors, the impact of customary rights on productivity and investment remains under-researched. Using unique data from an experiment in Malawi, we show that (i) parcel-level bequest and sale rights affect investment and cash crop adoption; (ii) impacts are gender-differentiated -women's rights affect investment and men's cash crop adoption- and vary by inheritance regime; and (iii) measurement error associated with traditional approaches to survey data collection easily obscures these effects. Beyond reinforcing the need for careful empirical research, this suggests that gradual erosion of women's customary rights may reduce land related investment and that measures other than titling (e.g. changes in family law or legal support) may enhance it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]